Late substitutes who crashed the party to make their names

As the title suggests, these should be significant wins that helped catapult the late sub on to greater things.

I have a couple to start us off:

Willie Pastrano was a 6-1 underdog who was a substitute for a substitute when he won the light heavyweight title over Harold Johnson.

Harold was originally slated to defend vs Mauro Mina of Peru, but Mina pulled out after being injured in training. Henry Hank was enlisted as a replacement, but he, too, got injured in training.

Enter Willie Pastrano, who greatly enhanced his all-time standing and resume with the win.

A lesser-known one:

Tony Sibson was also a third-choice sub when he won the British middleweight crown off Frank Lucas.

Alan Minter vacated the crown (I think to fight for the Euro title) and Lucas was tapped to fight Bunny Sterling for the BBBofC belt.

Sterling fell out and was replaced by Kevin Finnegan, who then also dropped out (I think both Sterling and Finnegan sustained training injuries).

Along comes Sibbo to fill the bill at Royal Albert Hall and makes a splash with a fifth-round KO.

From there, Sibson (who had a nice record but had recently been beaten by a journeyman and wasn’t really a solid contender until beating Lucas changed his trajectory) went on to win the Euro title and contend for world honors.

Who are some more subs who became heroes?

 

Ruiz is the one who immediatly springs to mind.

Vitaly of course lost, but he redeemed himself from quitting against Byrd in the eyes of many when he wanted to continue against Lewis.

 

I love Isidro Garcia's story. Jose "Carita" Lopez was scheduled to fight for a vacant WBO flyweight title against Alejandro Montiel. Montiel pulled out hours before the fight - and in stepped in Isidro Garcia, who just happend to be there as a spectator.
Such is the story anyway. I wonder if it's not a bit exaggerated for an effect? I'd like to verify it some time - as I wonder about fighter's ability to make weight on that short notice - but I surely hope it's true!

 

Andy Ganigan was a late substitute for Howard Davis Jr. when Ganigan challenged Sean O'Grady. Ganigan knocked out O'Grady in two. Ganigan was awarded a shot at Alexis Arguello, and gave Arguello hell before finally falling. Everyone who was a fan back then remembers Ganigan for those two fights and his seven months in the spotlight.

Arturo Frias accepted a lightweight title fight with Claude Noel on 11 days notice, when original opponent Gonzalo Montellano backed out. Frias won the title from Noel by knockout. Now, he's immortalized by being the champ Ray Mancini knocked out in one round to win his lightweight belt.

Humberto Soto was a late sub for featherweight champion In Jin Chi when Soto fought top-rated Olympian Rocky Juarez for an interim title. Soto upset Juarez, who ended up never winning a world title, and Soto went on to become a two-weight champion, himself. (I actually attended that fight, and celebrated with Soto's team all the way back to their dressing room, before they realized nobody knew who I was or why I was there. )

 

Fighting Harada was a late sub when he unseated fly champ Kingpetch. ironically, Harada himself would lose his bw title years later to a late sub in Lionel Rose.

Terence Crawford introduced himself to the world when he stepped in as a late sub vs. Breidis prescott & proceeded to box his ears off.

Bert Cooper didn't beat Holyfield, but he provided the boxing world a thrill when he dropped him after stepping in as a sub for a sub.

 

The great Azumah Nelson had only 13 fights and was completely unknown when he was a late substitute to fight the great Salvador Sanchez. Nelson gave Sanchez all that he could handle through 15 rounds. He came up short in that fight but was far from done as he went on to be one of the true greats of the the 80's and 90's. Sadly, we never got to see a rematch and we lost one the greatest fighters ever when Sanchez dies in August of the same year.

 

Not exactly a last minute sub but, almost

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I remember we had a local guy who made it big. Won the IBF belt and defended it 5 times. He was hyped up pretty heavily as a badass. IIRC his next opponent flaked out and they needed to find somebody fast. So they got some guy from the Philippines to fight him, and everybody hoped that this dude wouldn't be too much of a loser and at least put up some resistance:

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Humberto Soto filled in for In Jin Chi on 2 weeks notice and beat undefeated Rocky Juarez on the way to becoming a multiple time world champ

 

Diego Rosario was an up and coming hotshot in the bantamweight ranks and had lost a highly controversial 12 round split to Johnny 'Dancing Machine' Carter and they signed for a huge rematch for the USBA title. At the last minute Carter had to withdraw and the promoter searched and finally found some lowly ranked fighter at #10 in the USBA ratings for Rosario to pad his record on. Unfortunately for Rosario, the kid was Gaby Canizales, who bludgeoned Rosario in 5 rounds. A year later Canizales was challenging Jeff Chandler for the world title.

 

Gaby is truly underappreciated imo. I didn’t realize he got catapulted toward the top by a late-sub win, though. Thanks for educating me on a fighter I truly admire.

 

Stevie Cruz took the title from McGuigan as a late sub if im not mistaken

 

Steve Robinson earned the name of Cinderella Man too after coming in at 48 hours notice to win the WBO featherweight title in a gruelling 12 round war punctuated with Robinson staggering big punching John Davison in the last round to take a deserved decision in front of Davison´s adoring fans.

I remember reading that Robinson was signing on at the local Unemployment office day he got the call to go and fight Davison.

He had a 13-9 record, not known as much of a puncher whilst Davison was a terrific southpaw puncher, knocked out WBC featherweight champion Paul Hodkinson in a round in the amateurs. Had won the WBC international title and recently won the British featherweight crown and had suffered 2 controversial losses for the EBU title in France.

Robinson went on to make 7 defences of his WBO crown before being destroyed by Naseem Hamed. Still he did manage to comeback and win an EBU title and was on the verge of earning another world title shot when he lost to Juan Carlos Ramirez.

Davison was finished as a fighter, losing his British title by 4 round ko to former 3 weight World champion Duke McKenzie who himself was koed in 9 by Steve Robinson!

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Good one! I didn't think anyone would top my Azumah Nelson one but Cruz does becasue he dug down deep to drop McGuigan twice in the 15th round and won the fight.

Cruz is somewhat of a forgotten champion. I can't remember the last time anyone posted about him on this forum.

 

Which is ironic, as Byrd was also a late replacement for Vitali.

 

Jeff Harding was a late substitute for Donny Lalonde when he captured the WBC Light Heavy title against Dennis Andries. Harding copped an absolute shellacking from Andries through the first half of the fight before turning the tables and stopping him in the final round. I assume there's people in here that have never seen the fight... you're genuinely missing out. It's incredible.